Octavia E. Butler’s Parable Of The Sower Created By Toshi Reagon and Bernice Johnson Reagon WHAT TO KNOW BEFORE THE SHOW Design for Sharing Demonstration Performance UCLA Royce Hall March 6, 2020 ABOUT THE PERFORMANCE The company is a unique collective of artists whose Octavia E. Butler’s Parable of the Sower Created by Toshi Reagon and Bernice Johnson Reagon Based on the novels Parable of the Sower and Parable of the Talents by Octavia E. Butler, this genre-defying work of theater features a powerhouse ensemble of 20 singers, actors, and musicians. It harnesses 200 years of black musical tradition to bring Butler’s acclaimed science fiction books to life in song. Written by singer, composer and producer Toshi Reagon in collaboration with her mother, Bernice Johnson Rea- gon (song leader, composer, scholar, social activist, and founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock), Parable of the Sower is a mesmerizing theatrical work of rare power and beauty. At this special performance for youth audiences, Toshi and members of the cast will perform selected songs from the production, as well as other songs connected to the themes of community and social action. About the Creators Toshi Reagon is a versatile singer-songwriter and producer, drawing on the traditions of uniquely American mu- sic: rock, blues, R&B, country, folk, spirituals and funk. Toshi has been performing since she was 17 years old. Her career really launched when Lenny Kravitz chose her, straight out of college, to open for him on his first world tour. Some of Toshi’s proudest moments include playing for her godfather Pete Seeger’s 90th birthday cele- bration at Madison Square Garden, and performing with the Freedom Singers at the White House, in a tribute to the music of the civil rights movement. As a composer and producer, Toshi has created original scores for dance works, collaborated on two contemporary operas, served as producer on multiple albums, and has had her own work featured in films and TV soundtracks. Born in Atlanta and raised in Washington, DC, she comes from a musical—and political—family. Both her par- ents were civil rights activists in the 1960s, and founding members of the Freedom Singers, part of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee. Her mother, Bernice Johnson Reagon, is a major cultural voice for freedom and justice; singing, composing, teaching, and speaking out against racism and injustice of all kinds. She is Professor Emeritus of History at Amer- ican University, Curator Emeritus at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History, and the author of two foundational texts in the study of African American music and cultural history, Wade in the Water: African American Sacred Music Traditions and Africans in America: America’s Journey Through Slavery. She is also the founder of the legendary a capella group Sweet Honey in the Rock. Her pioneering work as a scholar, teacher, and artist have been recognized with a Presidential Medal for contribution to public understanding of the Humanities and a MacArthur Fellowship. Together, this powerful mother-daughter team wrote the music and lyrics for Parable of the Sower. WHO WAS OCTAVIA BUTLER? Octavia Estelle Butler was born in Pasadena, California in 1947. As the first science fiction writer to be awarded a MacArthur Fellowship, and the first black woman to enter the predominantly white and male world of science fic- tion, Butler’s pursuit of a writing career required her to traverse many uncharted waters. Butler responded to her own self-doubt by writing affirmations and notes of encouragement to herself. “I am a best- selling writer,” one entry, dated 1975, reads. “I write bestselling books.” She sometimes ends these affirmations with “So be it! See to it!” Butler also kept journals and made copious notes about her characters, ideas and themes while writing. Sometimes in notebooks, and sometimes written on a scrap paper, or in shaky handwriting while riding a bus, these notes give us insight into her creative process as it unfolded, her broader thinking about the world, and her determination to succeed. Butler published 12 novels and a collection of short stories. She was the recipient of both the Hugo and the Nebula Awards, prestigious prizes for science fiction or fantasy literature. She is perhaps best known for her critically ac- claimed 1979 novel Kindred, which takes place in both 1970s Altadena, California, and the antebellum South and explores topics of race, power, and our relationship with the past. Today, her 1993 novel Parable of the Sower and its sequel, Parable of the Talents, are often called prophetic or prescient. Set in 2024 in a dystopian version of Los Angeles, Parable of the Sower imagines what kind of collapse might result if the forces of climate change, mass incarceration, big pharma, gun violence, the tech industry, and profit-driven government continued unhampered for 30 years. “This was a cautionary tale, although people have told me it was prophecy,” Butler once said in remarks at MIT. “All I have to say to that is: I certainly hope not.” Her untimely death at age 58 in 2006 shocked and devastated members of the science fiction community. Butler and her work continue to influence writers and readers around the globe. Contemporary writers have published multiple anthologies, containing both stories and essays, in her memory. At The Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens near Pasadena, scholars continue to learn about her work and her life through the study of the Octavia E. Butler Papers. Patti Perret, photograph of Octavia E. Butler seated by her bookcase, 1986. Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. © Patti Perret. IN HER OWN WORDS The page below comes from Octavia Butler’s archives at The Huntington Library. You can see, in her own handwriting, the central idea of Parable of the Sower. In the margins, she has noted the challenges and ob- stacles that must be overcome. Octavia E. Butler, notes on Parable of the Sower, "This is the coming-of-age story..." ca. 1989. Huntington Library, Art Museum, and Botanical Gardens. ©Estate of Octavia E. Butler Parable of the Sower: An Overview In Butler’s Parable of the Sower, Southern California in 2024 is a landscape of devastation caused by environ- mental disasters and governmental corruption. There has been no rain for years; people will kill for fresh water. Homelessness, hunger, drug addiction, and violence are rampant. Lauren Oya Olamina is the 15-year-old daughter of a Baptist preacher. The family lives in the walled—and heav- ily armed—town of Robledo, near Los Angeles. Lauren feels disconnected from her father’s religion, and has begun a notebook with a series of short poems that reflect her own understanding of God. She calls her new reli- gion Earthseed. In the novel, each chapter opens with an Earthseed verse. Lauren is also what’s called in the novel a “sharer.” She has an unusual hyper-empathy syndrome, causing her to physically feel what other people—and to a lesser extent, animals—feel when they're in pleasure or pain. Some people think of this as a disability, others consider it a kind of superpower. It’s a trait that helps make Lauren con- cerned with improving life for everyone around her, but also makes her extremely vulnerable. Robledo is attacked and destroyed in a terrible fire, and Lauren’s family is killed. Along with a small group of survivors, Lauren begins a long and dangerous trek north, following rumors of jobs, safety, and farmable land. Lauren’s group gathers followers along the journey, forging a new community from a diverse collection of survi- vors. Under Lauren’s leadership, they establish the first Earthseed community, a settlement they name Acorn. The central idea of Lauren’s Earthseed philosophy is that change is the only controlling force in the universe. She sums it up in this verse: All that you touch You Change. All that you Change Changes you. The only lasting truth is Change. She believes that humankind's destiny is to travel beyond Earth and live on other planets as our needs outgrow Earth’s resources, and that we should not try to subdue or control Earth. The only way to succeed is to be united as a community with shared goals. KEY TERM: ADAPTATION When a novel, short story or other written work is the basis for a movie, play, TV series or other kind of media, it is known as a literary adaptation. This production of Parable of the Sower is a musical adaptation of Butler’s novel; Toshi Reagon and Bernice Johnson Reagon used their own art form to explore the themes and ideas in the book in song and on stage. For Toshi, some of the most important ideas are kinship, community, and how we can work to- gether to overcome the challenges we face—in Butler’s words: unite, help one another. KEY TERM: SCIENCE FICTION Science fiction (sometimes called sci fi or just SF) is a form of fiction or storytelling that typically deals with imag- inative and futuristic concepts like advanced science and technology innovations, space exploration, time travel, parallel universes, and extraterrestrial life. It often explores the potential consequences of scientific, social, and technological innovations or failures. Writing Ourselves In This page from one of Butler’s pocket note- books shows us her thoughts on why stories matter. It also helps us think about representa- tion, and who decides what stories get shared. In the middle paragraph, she reflects on the re- ality of life in the “old west”—which would have included many different races and back- grounds—as opposed to the predominantly white representation of it in popular Westerns on TV (like The Lone Ranger).